


Acute Hypothermia and Other Conditions You Can't Recover From in One Night

by She5los



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Autistic Linhardt von Hevring, Depression, Depression Talks in the middle of the night, Drowning, Gen, Hypothermia, It's definitely about how those two things aren't mutually exclusive, It's kind of about when things get to be Too Much and you can't handle them, Manuela just wants to get all these teenagers through school alive, Marianne is the primary supporting character but if anything is pre-romantic it's Lin and Caspar, Shock, Suicide Attempt, and it's kind of about stepping up when you're really needed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-14
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-30 12:14:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,325
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21428044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/She5los/pseuds/She5los
Summary: Marianne tries to walk into a lake.  Linhardt refuses to let anyone die.  Manuela kind of just wants a drink.
Relationships: Caspar von Bergliez & Linhardt von Hevring, Linhardt von Hevring & Manuela Casagranda, Marianne von Edmund & Linhardt von Hevring, Marianne von Edmund/Hilda Valentine Goneril
Comments: 26
Kudos: 225





	Acute Hypothermia and Other Conditions You Can't Recover From in One Night

It was always Linhardt with his hands in the blood.

He wouldn't saddle anyone else with that responsibility, wouldn't even consider playing any role in the Eagles except being their healer, but medical publications liked to glance over how many bodily fluids were involved in medicine. A field medicine guide warning that nausea is a common symptom of shock fails to portray the sentiment of "you will get your childhood friend's vomit in your hair around the same time his legs give out and you fail to keep him standing, and for a moment the world will crumble around you, and in the next moment you'll heal his arm and everything will get a bit better."

So he tried to study as many types of injuries and conditions as he could. He memorized the clinical wording, knowing it wouldn't adequately portray that it was Linhardt who would have his hands in the blood, removing arrows, sewing wounds with thread and with magic and then going to be sick as time distorted around him for a few minutes. It was all he could do.

And, with his complete lack of a "sleep schedule" or "circadian rhythm," he was sometimes the only option. He sometimes saw things he wasn't supposed to see.

For example, he was gathering herbs one night by the pond, because while plants were harder to identify at night, this was a whole nice plot of a plant that was essentially a weed, but it had important medicinal properties for fatigue relief. He saw someone, a good distance away, walking toward the water and pausing on the edge. Her hair was in a tidy updo, and he thought it shone blue in the moonlight. Marianne, then. He didn't really know her. He returned to gathering herbs, keeping an eye out; it was pretty unusual for people to come to the lake past one in the morning.

He wasn't watching when she stepped in.

He didn't see her make the decision, or the first move, or whatever would have been significant about that moment. He looked up and she was in nearly to her knees in lake water he wouldn't have braved even on a hot, sunny day, and she didn't appear to be stopping.

He dropped his herb basket and ran.

His legs pumped harder than they ever had in his life. There was just so much shore between them.  _ There is a willow grows aslant a brook,  _ his horrible brain supplied, _ Who shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream. _ He didn't know if it was better for her to know someone was watching, or if that would be too risky, so he waited until he was mere yards from her --and she was in to her waist -- before he yelled for her. Her name tore its way out of his exhausted lungs. He'd never heard his voice sound so loud before, made ugly by trying to pull too much sound from his vocal chords. She looked up and saw him, and then she dove forward, laying face-down on the surface as her skirts spread behind her, floating from the air bubbles trapped under them.

_ Her clothes spread wide and, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up; which time she chaunted snatches of old tunes, as one incapable of her own distress, or like a creature native and indued unto that element-- _

He was close, he was  _ so close, _ he was nearly ready to get in the water, and she was losing him precious seconds. He shouldn't have yelled. He should have assumed she was resolved to do this. He didn't know her well, only saw her at the chapel or in passing, so he didn't have a good feel for her temperament.

The first steps into the water were horrible, and the second-worst part was when his waist was submerged. The lake was icy, and the night air was cold. Every second it took to reach Marianne put her in more danger.

And, just like they didn't tell you about blood or vomit in your hair, what the manuals never told you was this: when you're dragging your classmate out of the lake in the middle of the night, you will also be dragging her wet skirt, and that will slow you down in the water and be nearly impossible to manage on land.  _ Long it could not be till that her garments, heavy with their drink, pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay to muddy death _ . And it will be Linhardt, again, with his hands on her chest as she does her best impression of frozen death, and it will be Linhardt whose long coat gets covered in improbable amounts of slimy pond water, followed by watery vomit as his classmate's body continues to convulse.

He was exhausted already. He didn't know quite how to get her back to Garreg Mach. Her eyes were open, but unfocused, and she made soft noises that didn't indicate coherence.

Most people could do some approximation of walking even if they weren't really up to do it on their own. Linhardt had to hope Marianne's legs could more or less hold her up, or she was screwed.

...Would it be possible to remove one of her skirts? They were just so heavy. He was unbuttoning her coat to see if she was wearing a skirt or a dress under it when her whole body was overtaken by wracking coughs. Scant mouthfuls of water came out, but nothing that should cause such a big reaction. (Then again, algae in your lungs was probably a pretty good cause for all that coughing.). It made handling her unconscious body harder, but Linhardt did still manage to get her skirt off of her and rebutton some of her coat. Then, because all that running earlier hadn't tested his endurance enough, he hauled Marianne upright and found he'd been right: she was stumbling and leaning heavily on him, but she was close enough to walking that he wouldn't have to figure out how to carry her. He did a quick healing on her chest, just to hold her over until they could get her real treatment, and pulled her barely-standing, powerfully shivering body back to the monastery.

"Wait," she said when they were nearly there. "Stop." She sounded exhausted. Linhardt stopped. "I don't… want the others to know."

Linhardt frankly didn't care who knew. He'd wake up the whole monastery if it kept her alive. But he said, "I have to tell an adult. Someone who can heal you. I'll let you decide who."

That really only left two options, and Rhea would probably be weird about it, but Marianne was churchy, right? So Linhardt was at least a little surprised when she said, "...Manuela?"

She had another coughing fit that nearly pulled both of them over.

The guard stood watch at the gate, as always, and Linhardt explained nothing to him, just told him to ensure Manuela went to the infirmary. They probably looked a mess, both covered in algal slime and shore mud, Marianne with her coat and shift but not her skirt, near to fainting from exhaustion. That wasn't how Linhardt had wanted to spend his Thursday evening, but it was what he was doing now. In the morning, he'd go back to the lake and collect the abandoned skirt and his basket of herbs. For now, now that the adrenaline was starting to drain out of him, he just wanted a nap.

Manuela met them just outside the infirmary, looking unkempt and judgy. "Well, well, look what the cats dragged-- oh, Goddess, Marianne, are you alright?"

"She almost drowned," Linhardt said, which wasn't a lie, but he followed it up with, "Fell off the pier," which definitely was. "The water was freezing. I got her under-skirt off, but her coat's just as wet." And her hair, and all of her.

"In the infirmary, there is a blanket warming box," Manuela told him immediately, positioning herself under Marianne's other arm. Linhardt stretched his back and listened to ensure he got all of Manuela's instructions. "It shouldn't take much fire magic to heat it," she added. He knew already, could remember from a lesson toward the beginning of the school year, but he was glad to be reminded. His thoughts were everywhere, the exhaustion of running and swimming and hauling Marianne back to the monastery making his mind scattered.

The chest was in the corner, where it always was, thin black stone that could take sudden heat. Linhardt checked for blankets inside and saw there was a good stock, so he gathered his magic and surrounded the chest with flame for a couple seconds.

He didn't know what to do then, as he waited for the stone chest to heat the blankets inside, and without  _ doing _ something, he felt antsy. Also, he was still freezing.

Manuela followed him in, supporting Marianne, and Linhardt was struck by Marianne's hair style. She always looked so neat when they took classes together, her hair perfectly braided and taped in a circle around her head. But now, one of her braids had fallen and the other was only half up. It felt intrusive to see her like that.

Manuela was already working on the buttons of Marianne's uniform jacket, and she said, "Good, now go into my suite, to the bathroom, and bring back all the towels." Like she didn't even notice Marianne's hair, or was somehow able to put it out of her mind.

He ran through the door to Manuela's suite, which adjoined the infirmary. He'd been in there before, usually when Manuela was looking for a particular book, and it took no time to find the bathroom. The linen closet was next to the door, and Linhardt grabbed a stack of towels and brought them back. His heart was pounding in his chest. His hands were freezing.

"Good," Manuela said as he put the towels down on her desk and brought one over to Marianne. "Now, get out of those wet clothes, dry yourself off, and get in bed. I'll bring the warm blankets over when they're ready."

"But Marianne--" Linhardt started. He needed to  _ do _ something.

"I've got Marianne. I'm nearly done here. You also need to warm up." Marianne coughed deeply, convulsing in Manuela's grip. "I know, kid," Manuela murmured, and touched Marianne's chest with her fingers glowing softly white. "There you go." She looked up at Linhardt and said, "What, you think I wanna deal with two sick kids tomorrow? Grab a towel, get dry, and get in bed. Blankets and tea are coming in a minute."

"I healed her chest earlier," Linhardt said. He didn't know why he said it; it was taking so much focus just to grab himself a towel and take it back to the bed next to Marianne's. "There's probably pond scum in her lungs, though. It wasn't too deep where she fell."

Linhardt removed his clothes methodically with fingers that didn't want to obey him: boots, jacket, pants, socks, shirt, dry his arms and most of his legs, and then quickly shuck off his wet underthings, towel himself off quickly, and dive into a bed that was the same temperature as the unused infirmary at night, with only one blanket on. He nestled into the covers as Manuela began drying Marianne. He turned away for modesty, trying to convince his frantic brain that his job was done. He could relax; he was miserable in a non-emergency way, and the feeling that his numb hands twitched with the need for something to do, some task to carry out, was just a leftover from when he was able to help.

He wasn't looking, and was a bit checked out, when a warm blanket settled over him like… Well, like a warm blanket. He was still shivering, but finally it felt like maybe he would be warm again soon. He turned onto his back, almost relaxed for once, and turned his head to see Marianne looking peaceful. As he watched, and as Manuela put a second warm blanket over him, she shuddered to life and began shivering violently.

Manuela turned away from him and touched Marianne's damp head. "Good, that's good," she murmured. "Let's get some life back in you."

The next warm blanket was for Marianne, but Linhardt's body temperature was normalising fast and his hands didn't ache with cold anymore.

By Linhardt's estimation, Marianne got about twice as many heated blankets as he did. He wasn't jealous. He finally felt comfortable, and Marianne was still shivering and sometimes coughing. She hadn't really woken yet, still looking distant and dazed. He lay still and tried not to fidget as Manuela moved around, starting a fire and a kettle for tea, grabbing both of them loose infirmary nightgowns for when they needed clothes, always returning to hover over Marianne.

"You're quiet over there," Manuela accused him as he started to drowse. "How are you feeling?"

Linhardt yawned and said, "Much better. More or less normal. I was thinking of sleeping, if it's okay to sleep here."

"I want to get some tea into you first," Manuela told him. "Just to make sure you're warmed through. Then, if you want, I can even release you back to your own room. I'll be in the next room, okay? Can you yell if something goes wrong with Marianne?"

Linhardt nodded and asked, "Does that mean I'll need to sit up?" He wasn't exactly pleased about the idea, even if something hot to drink sounded amazing.

Manuela put a hand over her mouth and her shoulders shook and she said, "Yeah, you gotta sit up, Linhardt. If you want to go back to your room, you have to convince me you can walk there, and sitting up is a good in-between step."

Linhardt grimaced and propped himself up on his elbow, saying, "Yes, I can yell. Do you have any angelica?"

"I have a new chamomile-lavender tea. You'll love it," Manuela told him, and disappeared into her bedroom, leaving the door cracked.

It was a few minutes and Linhardt had pulled a flannel nightshirt on when Marianne came to. His hands still twitched for something to do, but instead, he stayed put and quietly cried out the last of his adrenaline, and watched Marianne shiver herself awake.

He knew she was awake because her eyes focused. They focused on him, specifically, lit by the scant, warm light of candles. "Manuela's only gone for a minute," he told her apologetically. "She's making us some tea."

"These covers are burning," she told him, which was Probably Not Great, but on the other hand, she was warm enough to be awake now because of those blankets. "How am I so cold when the blankets are so hot?" She coughed from deep in her chest, but it didn't turn into a fit.

"You nearly froze," Linhardt told her, not adding 'to death' half so he wouldn't upset her and half in case that was still something she wanted.

He thought maybe, if he was Caspar or Sylvain or half the boys at the monastery, he'd be very excited to see one of his female classmates undressed. He knew full well that, under the many layers of blankets, she was as naked as he'd been a couple minutes ago. But the vulnerability of the situation made the idea of getting any pleasure out of it repulsive. And, anyway, Linhardt was mostly interested in gathering his topmost blanket off his bed and pulling it tightly around himself. He yawned hugely and hoped he'd be able to leave and go to sleep soon.

"Do you expect me to thank you?" Marianne asked quietly, her speech juddering as she shivered.

"Not really," Linhardt told her. Considering he'd ruined her plan, he kind of expected her to be pissed. "I'll settle for you staying alive."

"Why?" She kept her voice low, and Linhardt saw she was looking at the open door to Manuela's suite. "You barely know me. We don't even take classes together. Why would you go to all this effort to save my life?" She coughed some more, and turned onto her side, away from him.

"Because I'm a healer," Linhardt told her. "That's what I do. And I know, when I think of the Eagles getting hurt, it makes me feel sick." Time for a joke maybe? Did Marianne like jokes? "Even Dorothea, and she was mean to Caspar. I mean, Caspar! The guy only has three working brain cells, and he blew two of them on tree climbing when we were kids. And she tricked him into moving her furniture for her, instead of just asking. And, if anything happened to her, I'd never stop blaming myself if I knew I could've done something and I didn't. So, I don't know you very well. But I know there's someone who does, who feels sick when they think of you getting hurt. And I'll settle for that person's thanks."

He couldn't see Marianne's face ever since she'd turned on her side, but after a moment, she made quiet sounds that sounded like crying between deep, hacking coughs, so Linhardt didn't look at her. He focused on warming up until Manuela got back, and then gripped the handle and rim of the mug he was handed. He sipped cautiously and found the tea was just as hot as he'd expected.

He felt more human halfway into his mug of tea. He turned his attention to Marianne again, who was talking quietly with Manuela and beginning to sit up.

The fallen braid caught his eye again. Marianne always looked so tidy. She pulled that perfect Fódlan braid around her head every day, perfectly tucked into the root of her other braid, her bangs elegantly pulled out, and her clothes were always neatly pressed, and she really seemed to have it together. Linhardt had only gotten a small suggestion of the texture of her hair from the bangs she allowed to stay free. But he'd braided his hair for swimming before, and had to untangle it afterward, so now he said, "Marianne, would you like me to take down your hair? It's no fun when it dries like that."

Marianne hesitated for a moment, looking at Manuela, and then turned to him and said, "Yes, I think I'd like that."

Linhardt got out of bed, keeping the blanket around his shoulders, and went to undo Marianne's hair, untying her errant braid and untangling it from the blue cord that kept it in place on her head. The Fódlan braids he undid from the roots, untangling them to the tips after dealing with the braid Marianne kept coiled inside one of the Fódlan braided sections. Before he went to sit down again, he yawned and said, "There, that should be easier to deal with in the morning," meaningless words, kind words like he'd been taught to say to reassure his patients.

He wanted to fall asleep right there, sitting on a hospital bed with a sheet and three blankets over his lap. He was so nice and warm.

He was drifting a bit when Manuela raised her voice and said, "Linhardt? Did you fall asleep? I was about to release you, if you'd like to sleep in a comfier bed tonight."

Linhardt fought a battle in his mind between the immediate comfort of sinking down under the covers versus the more satisfying sleep he'd get in his own bed, and decided his spine and hips were worth a flight of stairs, even at two in the morning. He nodded and said, "I'd like to sleep in my own bed," but even he could hear how exhausted his voice sounded.

He walked through the cold halls of Garreg Mach in the nightshirt, the blanket, and a pair of socks Manuela had brought him, and thought about how good his own bed would feel. He wanted to clean up first, get the pond scum out of his hair. But he was unimaginably tired, so as soon as he entered his room, he went to sleep.

.-._.-._.-._

He set out in the morning, before breakfast, before most of his classmates had woken up, and brought his and Marianne's lost things, along with his borrowed things, back to Garreg Mach. He brought both to the infirmary, since it was Manuela he'd been researching local herbs with. He'd folded the skirt and tucked it under the herbs in case anyone saw him carrying something of Marianne's, but none of the other students were up.

Manuela could hardly be called "awake," either, though she fit the technical description. She looked like she'd been drinking undue amounts of tea and was still struggling to stay alert. But you couldn't just abandon someone who'd nearly drowned; you needed to watch over them. So Linhardt set his herbs down on the pharmacy table, carefully extracted Marianne's skirt, and told Manuela, "I can take over from you. I've just gotten a night's sleep."

"It can't have been five hours," Manuela pointed out.

Linhardt just shrugged and said, "I nap during the day. How's she been?"

"Sleeping soundly," Manuela told him, which was a good sign. "She woke up coughing twice, but only twice. Is that her skirt?"

"I went to the lake to retrieve it," Linhardt said. "And the herbs we discussed. I was picking them last night, but Marianne took precedence."

"Well," Manuela said, standing up, "If you could take over for a few hours, I'd appreciate it."

'A few' actually meant 'several,' Linhardt knew, but he was more stalwart than he liked to let people think, so he said, "You go get some breakfast. I'll be here."

Manuela nodded, then a moment later, reconsidered and said, "And no sleeping on the job."

"Oh, no, what will I do without my midmorning nap?" Linhardt joked. "Actually, can you have breakfast sent here? I'd probably forget, on my own."

"I'll have it seen to," Manuela promised. "If I screw it up, there are trail rations in the bandage cupboard, in the top-right corner. Not great, but they'll keep you going."

"I'll pull some out right now," Linhardt suggested, "Just in case, since my problem is forgetting to eat." He sounded weird now, didn't he? Just like a total oddball. But he went to the cabinet and pulled out a cloth-wrapped packet and set it on the table next to Marianne.

"If she struggles to breathe and a healing doesn't cut it, come get me," Manuela instructed. "I'll be in the dining hall and then my room. Don't try to be a hero; you're still learning."

"Oh, you don't have to worry about that," Linhardt reassured her. "I hate being the hero. I'd much rather be in the background."

Manuela smirked at him and said, "Sure, kid." She didn't believe him, but at least someone understood his sarcasm.

Manuela was gone for about three minutes, plenty of time to get as far away as possible, when Marianne started drowning again.

And that was just his luck, wasn't it? That she would be under observation for hours, and as soon as he stepped in, she'd do something horribly worrying. He wondered how long it had been before he noticed, since it was disturbingly quiet. He was pulled from his reading when her body started convulsing, and he didn't even realize at first what it was.

He'd read about this. It was called  _ dry drowning, _ when the throat went into spasm to keep water out, but there was no water to keep out. He had to admit, that did nearly convey the urgency of watching his classmate, her wavy hair strewn across her pillow, go from calm sleep to unnatural movement in the time it took for him to read a couple pages.

He summoned his faith magic and touched the base of her throat with intention. He didn't know whether it was a problem with the throat, or if it was the throat responding to a problem with the lungs, but he figured the healing would reach where it needed to go.

Marianne gasped in thin, whistling breaths around the blockage in her throat. Linhardt panicked and healed her again, and she gasped in huge gulps of air. Crisis averted. Okay, what next? Telling her to breathe would be redundant, and he was definitely terrible at reassuring people. He was supposed to get Manuela, but surely he was supposed to ensure Marianne could breathe first? Or was this exactly what she meant by "don't try to be a hero"? Linhardt only knew he wasn't supposed to be in charge of these decisions.

Maybe, if he could find someone in the hall, he wouldn't have to go far. He'd left Garreg Mach that morning before anyone was awake, but they had to get up for Friday classes, right? It was nearly seven; surely, someone would be heading to breakfast.

He ran into the hall, turned the corner, and saw movement. It took less than a moment to identify the bright purple figure down the hall.

"Lorenz!" Linhardt yelled. "I need you to go to the dining hall and tell Manuela to come to the infirmary."

"Ah, Linhardt. You're up early. I was sure I'd heard you slept your days away."

"That's irrelevant. Go to the dining hall. Get Manuela." Couldn't he hear the urgency in Linhardt's voice? Sending a healer to the infirmary should be a command to act on instantly.

Lorenz didn't move. "You're very excited about your studies, aren't you? What's she been teaching you recently?"

"It isn't for my studies," Linhardt told him. "Go get her. She's needed." Was he panicking? Was this what panicking felt like?

"Goodness, Linhardt, I know you're determined in your magic studies, but there's no need to--"

"Marianne nearly drowned last night, and she'll drown for real if you don't go get Manuela!" What was he doing? He'd promised not to tell. Marianne was going to be even angrier with him.

Lorenz looked shocked. Good. "Goodness, is she alright?" he asked, which was beyond useless.

"She's! Not!". He felt like he'd repeated himself twenty times already. "Get! Manuela!" Yelling was so unlike him. He was probably panicking. Was he panicking?

Lorenz  _ finally _ understood Linhardt's urgency, so he said, "I'm on it" and ran toward the dining hall. Linhardt ran back to the infirmary.

Marianne was still gasping, clutching at her chest. Linhardt pulled her hand aside for another healing, saying, "It's okay, Marianne, I've got you," even though he had no confidence in himself. The first two healings had done almost nothing; what would a third do? He absolutely did not have anything handled, but he reassured himself and told himself it was to reassure her.

Her gasping got louder, but he thought it was because more air was going through her throat. Linhardt checked the collar of her nightgown, but it was loose enough not to give her trouble.

He was still dithering uselessly over the best course of action when Manuela came back. She pushed him out of the way, said an incantation he'd never heard before, and pressed a hand to Marianne's chest. Marianne drew in a deep breath, and then another, and then she was gasping more like she'd overexerted herself and less like she was dying.

And Linhardt saw blood. There was no blood to see, but it was the  _ feeling _ of blood, the feeling that something wrong was happening, that the world had been turned inside-out. That Marianne, who he barely knew, had been turned inside-out. His head swam and time stopped existing.

He went to lean over the trash bin, and was sick into it. He sat against the wall so his knees couldn't give out on him. He shut his eyes as if that would keep the world from spinning, even though it never did.

When he came to, someone was stroking his hair. He hated having his head touched, so he shook off the hand.

"Good, you're back," Manuela's voice said, from somewhere distant. "Up you come." He was hauled bodily to his feet, and led across the room. He barely knew where he was until he was sat down on a soft surface that had to be an infirmary bed. From far away again, Manuela's voice said, "You're just in time," and then, after some period of time that could have been seconds or minutes, a hot mug was pushed into his hands and guided to his mouth.

He'd been in shock before. He'd been in shock in the field, and had to sort himself out. His eyes ached as he drank sweet tea and reflected on how he wouldn't have been able to save Marianne if he was the one she'd been depending on. If his social skills were better and he'd been faster in convincing Lorenz to get help, maybe he would have been able to get her a few more seconds of easy breathing. He was useless in every way, and he should never have been trusted with someone else's safety. Maybe he never should have been in the past, either.

"What's he doing?" Marianne's voice asked, coming to him as clearly as if she was behind a door. "Is he alright?"

"He'll be okay," Manuela said. Her next words were indecipherable to him. He sipped his tea.

A blanket was tugged around his shoulders and he nearly dropped his mug. The sturdy weight of a book landed on his lap. That weight grounded him and he saw Manuela standing over him, fretting over him, tugging the blanket a little tighter.

"I apologize," he said, breathing heavily. "I shouldn't have tried to heal her myself, I lost you time to--"

"Shhh, shhh, it's okay," Manuela soothed. "You did the right thing. You kept her alive until I got here. Drink your tea."

"I don't… usually fall apart when there's no blood," Linhardt told her. He needed her to know he wasn't useless. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have allowed you to leave me in charge. My healing studies haven't advanced far enough. I'll see if someone else can-- m-maybe Byleth or Rhea could--"

"Slow down, kiddo. Drink that, and then eat this toast." Manuela patted his head again, and he cringed, but she was already turning away to check on Marianne, saying, "How about you, Marianne? Is that better? Would you like to sit up?"

Linhardt focused on sipping his tea and didn't listen to Marianne's response. He didn't know if it was selfish to ignore her or if it was altruistic to ignore her now, when a better healer was in the room, so he'd have more energy to spare later. He could never keep track of when he was supposed to say he was caring for others or for himself, since the two were bound up together, anyway: by keeping his friends safe, he felt more secure. But, when he showed that he was focusing on himself, like when he fell asleep in public, he caught nothing but criticism.

It didn't matter, really. He  _ was _ lazy. Hopefully, other people would anticipate his laziness the same way he did, and let him ask questions to clarify if something about this conversation turned out to be important.

Halfway through the tea, he felt more coherent. He was warmer, and not so nauseous, and when he felt his neck for a pulse, it was strong and even under his fingertips. He kept sipping overly sweet tea, for warmth and for comfort and to buy himself more time before any questions were asked. He shouldn't have gone shocky like that. There wasn't even any blood.

Linhardt put his mug down on the end table and Manuela didn't even look up from the desk across the room, just said, "You'd better be eating that toast when I turn around, and not doing something silly like blaming yourself for shock."

Alright. He needed to pull himself together. He grabbed the toast, even though he felt the opposite of hungry. He bit off a small corner of a piece and chewed. He shivered slightly, even though he was wearing his winter uniform and a blanket.

He thought of Ferdinand, saying in his boisterous way,  _ Ah, Linhardt, back with us at last, I see. _ Of Lady Edelgard, or Hubert on her orders, quietly reminding him that they needed him fully present, that there were always injuries after battle so would it be possible at all to at least hold out until the painful but less life-threatening injuries were dealt with? And also, it was getting old having to care for their healer. Of Dorothea saying  _ Thanks for all the help _ in her most frustrated voice when she'd had to play healer for a bit after Linhardt had exhausted his magic in the field. So he ate his toast, since that would keep Manuela off his case, and stayed quiet so he wouldn't bother her, and tried and failed not to think about who would watch over Marianne since he'd proven so incompetent.

The toast did improve things, a bit. It wasn't more than his sensitive stomach could handle, and he felt less like the world was ending once he'd eaten it.

He was nearly done with the toast when Manuela walked over again and said, "How are you doing now, Lin?"

"A lot better," he told her honestly. "I still apologize for my incompetence. I can find someone else to watch Marianne while you go eat." It wasn't like him to apologize. Would it be worrying or refreshing to get an apology from him? And which healer would have adequate skill without betraying Marianne's trust in him?

"Oop, still shocky," Manuela told him. "Do you think you could handle some eggs? They sent eggs."

"It isn't shock," he protested. "Maybe you were under the impression that I take nothing seriously because very little in regular life is urgent. But I… I take survival very seriously. And I would do Marianne a disservice if I pretended I had anything more than introductory-level healing skills." When had his shoulders hunched? When had he started looking at the ground? Despite what he said, he did have  _ some _ pride. He straightened his back, but wasn't able to look up.

Manuela sat down to face him on the infirmary bed. "Do you think I don't know what spells you can do?" she asked quietly. Her tone made Linhardt's whole head quiet down.

He shook his head.

"Then, do you think I underestimated your ability to use the spells you do have?"

"I don't know," Linhardt admitted. He hadn't been thinking in those terms. "I just know she started dry-drowning and my spells barely did anything."

"Um, if you don't mind me saying, your spells definitely did something," Marianne interrupted. "You're the reason I could breathe before Manuela got here."

He didn't know how to feel about that. Marianne had already told him she wouldn't thank him. Why was she trying to cheer him up?

"And, anyway, you didn't try to heal her fully," Manuela pointed out. "You did exactly what I told you, and you fetched me as quickly as possible."

He wanted to say he'd screwed that part up, that it had taken several seconds to convince Lorenz to fetch her. Seconds Marianne should have had to breathe freely. But, as carefree as he was with his classmates, it was harder to tell Manuela how terrible he was with people, how inefficiently he'd conveyed that she was needed. He just nodded instead.

"It isn't unusual, as a beginning healer, to feel you're in over your head," Manuela told him. "I'm the one who ought to apologize. I didn't mean to make you think I'd abandoned you to handle everything yourself. I just didn't expect anything so big to happen."

Linhardt said, "Thank you," accepting her apology unconditionally. He knew it was probably beneath her to apologize to him; she probably wouldn't have done it if he hadn't gone into shock so quickly and obviously. He knew she would probably need something in return for her altruism, so he added, "I'll try to apply myself more during our lessons in future, so this doesn't happen again," still not looking at her.

It was the wrong thing to say because she groaned and asked, "How do you think anything that just happened was a problem with you not applying yourself?" There wasn't really an answer to that, so Linhardt shrugged. He wasn't exactly ready with a distracting comment after such an exhausting morning. "Cethleann restore me. Lin, you can't tell me your normal healing duties send you into shock and then convince me you're some kind of slacker. That isn't gonna happen."

Marianne was  _ right there. _ She was listening as Linhardt's deepest insecurities were bared. "Can we discuss this later?" Linhardt asked quietly. He grabbed his book belt, which he'd left on the table between his bed and Marianne's, and pulled it tight around the book in his lap just to have something to do. "It's bad enough my housemates know. I really don't need the Deer talking about it, too."

"What, that you're brave and determined?" Manuela asked, missing the point. "I would think you'd be bragging over that."

She wasn't really listening to him, but at least she was giving him an opening. "Well, I wouldn't want word to get around," he told her. "People might raise their expectations of me, and that's a slippery slope to a lot of work." He yawned as if for effect, but come to think of it, he'd only had about four hours of sleep in the last two days.

"Uh-huh," Manuela said, unbelieving. "A lot of work like risking hypothermia to bring your half-conscious classmate in from the lake?"

"Exactly like that," Linhardt agreed. "I'm happy to do it when no one expects it of me, but I can't be expected to step up  _ all _ the time. I do have crest research to do, after all." He doodled the shape of his crest in the air with his finger. "If Saint Cethleann is going to do either of us any favors, Professor, I think it's going to be me."

Manuela smiled, looking very pleased with herself (never good news), and said, "We'll see who ends up the better healer, then. Going back to your phobia, though, I really don't want to leave that unaddressed."

"It's fine," Linhardt told her, panicking again. "It's nothing I can't handle." He smiled in self-defense, to reassure her.

Manuela gave him a deeply pitying look -- the worst kind of look to get -- and said, "I can't just let you go back in the field knowing you're doing that to yourself. We need to figure out a plan so you can heal without the dramatics. Do your housemates know this is going on?"

Maybe he could find another healing teacher. He probably wouldn't be able to avoid Manuela completely, but taking lessons from someone else might be an effective method of avoidance. Maybe Byleth could help him, too?

"Linhardt? Are you alright? You're looking a little vacant there."

He smiled again, politely, and pulled his book belt over his head. He used to leave his books in all corners of the monastery, distractable as he was, and strapping them to his body seemed to be an effective solution. "Apologies. I'll-- try to get out of your hair soon." That wasn't related to her question, was it? "Petra and Ferdinand have planned an overnight camping expedition; I shouldn't miss it." There were no words for how slim the chances were of him going camping with the Black Eagles, but he'd try any suggestion that would get him away from this line of questioning. He stood up on the side of the bed that faced the door. "I'm going to need a nap and some lunch before we head out; I'll see you around, Professor."

Manuela stood when he did, and blocked the aisle between the bed he'd been using and the one next to it. "Yyyeahhhh, you're not going anywhere, kid," she said as Linhardt tried to dodge around her. "You're gonna burn yourself out if you keep on this way, and I'm not gonna let you." She turned to look at Marianne and said, "Right, Marianne? I'm getting all you kids through this academy alive. The Goddess might walk you up the stairs to the afterlife, but Manuela's the one yanking you back down to Earth by the collar."

Linhardt rolled across the bed that was blocking him in.

He probably would have gotten away, since Marianne was under observation and Manuela couldn't chase him down like certain Ferdinands he knew, but that was the exact moment Professor Byleth was trying to come in and he was blocked in long enough for Manuela to grab his book belt, and his current tome was two hundred years old, so he couldn't just drop it.

"Got you! Geez, if it's that hard to talk about, maybe I should put a medical freeze on your practicals until you've sorted yourself out." She'd been dragging Linhardt back to a bed, and now she pushed him down so he'd sit. Her hand stayed on his shoulder, pressing down, as she looked back toward Byleth and said, "Morning, Professor! There's been a change in plans. Marianne came in overnight with a respiratory thing, Linhardt needs a talking-to, and I need breakfast, so if you could keep Marianne company for a few, I'll be happy to reschedule our lesson once I've got this one sorted out." Her grip on Linhardt's shoulder tightened.

"Oh… Yeah, that's fine," Byleth said. They crossed the room and sat in the chair by Marianne's bed. "I'm sorry to hear you've been ill."

Marianne deflected politely and Manuela said, "She woke up twice with coughing fits in the early hours. I've been keeping her under observation, poor thing, but that means I haven't slept. If you could help me figure out who to ask for help later, I'd appreciate it." She pulled up on Linhardt's shoulder and he lurched to his feet. "We're going to go discuss some things in the next room, so call me if you need me, but Marianne did just have a healing, so it should hold for a bit." She took Linhardt's wrist -- not his hand, but his wrist -- and led him into the adjoining suite.

"Would you care to explain…  _ anything _ that just happened?" she asked when the door was shut.

"I'm sorry," Linhardt told her. "I'm in the habit of leaving awkward conversations."

Manuela just stared at him for a few seconds with a weird look on her face, and then said, "That isn't a thing, Linhardt. You don't physically run away from a conversation, even when you don't like it."

"Oh, I do, though," he corrected her. "It saves me a lot of grief. I wouldn't have to talk with you right now if I'd succeeded; I could be holed up in the library, or maybe my room, reading myself to sleep."

"Am I that scary?" Manuela asked, which was beside the point.

"My mind does… a thing," he admitted. "When people are upset with me, my feelings about it are amplified beyond reason. So I try to avoid people who have reason to dislike me." At least the door wasn't open. He wasn't sure what he'd do if Marianne and Byleth could hear.

After a very long moment, during which Linhardt convinced himself Manuela was going to decide he wasn't worth teaching anymore, Manuela said, "You're a pretty sensitive kid, aren't you, Linhardt?"

"I assure you, I've been told the opposite plenty of times," he told her.

She nodded. "Yeah… How do you feel about that?"

"I think a lot of people like imprecise wording," he admitted. "Usually, they actually mean I'm inconsiderate, which I definitely am."

"You're careless with words," she conceded. "I've seen a lot more people die from careless actions than careless words, so I can't say I'm bothered by that. But you come here often enough, and every other time I see you, you have really good questions about how to help your teammates. Really insightful questions. I'd call that considerate."

He didn't know what to say. He couldn't remember anyone ever noticing when he tried to be thoughtful; he certainly hadn't expected it from Manuela.

"It's good to be considerate," Manuela continued. "It builds your relationships. But I don't think self-sacrifice does the same thing. If you let yourself take an emotional wound the same way your teammates take physical ones, there's no way to repay that. There's no way for them to heal it the way you heal their cuts."

Linhardt wanted to leave. He wanted to be anywhere else, but if he tried to leave, he'd only end up with a longer lecture to listen to. "I just don't see how it matters," he pointed out. "Like you said: everyone needs to live. My role is to ensure that they do. Everything else is window dressing."

"That's bullshit and you know it," Manuela told him, sounding impatient, and he felt a twinge of anxiety, which only confirmed his earlier resolution to find a new magic teacher. There wouldn't be any facing Manuela after this; she was probably already sick of him. Surely, she was already planning a way to shunt him off onto someone else. She wouldn't be the first person who'd grown tired of him and realized they could be teaching a student who paid better attention, who didn't stay up all night and fall asleep in class, who didn't mouth off without realizing and then ask so many clarifying questions about his own rudeness that it sounded like mockery. "Or do you not also realize that  _ you _ need to live?"

"I'll live, Professor," Linhardt reassured her. "You don't need to worry about that. I value my own survival very highly."

"I don't mean surviving," Manuela said, cutting off his next sentence. "I mean living. Feeling fulfilled. Being happy to exist. You need to do that, too, or you end up dredged out of a lake one Fall morning, and everyone feels mystified and responsible at the same time. You're a great kid, Linhardt. I don't like to get sentimental, but I'm proud of you. So I need you to take good care of yourself, okay? I need you to live a life you're happy with, and I'm glad to help you figure out how healing can be part of that. I just can't let you put yourself on the chopping block for your housemates. You're worth more than that."

He didn't know how to respond. His head was all white noise as it tried to resolve the conflict between the way he'd assumed Manuela would feel and the words she'd just said. She wasn't one to give compliments freely, and though that didn't bother him, it made her encouragement that much more overwhelming.

She must need a response. It would be rude not to thank her. Linhardt opened his mouth, unsure of what would come out, and said, "I'm sorry; words aren't-- I can't make them--"

"Take your time," Manuela told him. "It's no trouble. It just seemed like you needed to know." 

No one was ever proud of him. The only quality he could be proud of was the intelligence he was constantly being told to apply to "worthier" goals. It had been years since someone had praised him in an academic context without first expounding on the many ways he'd slowed himself down.

"You don't think I'm lazy?" Linhardt clarified. "Because it's okay if you do. Everyone knows I am."

"Sorry, you were out gathering herbs at  _ when _ in the morning?" Manuela asked him. She looked skeptical.

"I-- skip lessons," Linhardt reminded her. "All the time. Just sleep right through them."

His mentor nodded at him and said, "Yeah, that was pretty frustrating for a while, up until I realized we never backtracked over the same material together. I'd like you to feel comfortable coming in before you've completely mastered my last lesson, but you're clearly learning, so who cares?"

He felt flayed open. He wasn't sure anyone had ever noticed before. He didn't know how to talk about his inability to ask for help with his lessons. He'd always been much happier to just avoid his teachers than admit that he was having trouble with his studies. He could cope with being called lazy; with his smarts being his only redeeming quality, he couldn't risk being called stupid.

"I need to-- do something in the library," he said, uncertain of why he was running away when he'd just received a genuine compliment. "Some research. I'll… be back later." He left the room and Manuela let him go. He didn't look at Professor Byleth or Marianne long enough to notice if they were looking at him. He felt like there was a sign pointing to him, telling the whole world how embarrassed he felt, but such things weren't real.

.-._.-._.-._

Linhardt was drowsing in the library, resting after reading an account of Saint Lamine, when hands slammed down on the table. He startled awake and groaned when he saw pink hair pooling on the table across from him. "You're welcome," he said sleepily, and tried to go back to sleep.

"Linhaaardt," Hilda said in her syrupy-sweet I-want-something-from-you voice, "Don't you want to tell me all about your heroics last night?"

"I'd rather not," he told her, and yawned. "What's more, I promised I wouldn't. Good night."

"Awww, Liiin, I'm sure she didn't mean to hide it from little old me," Hilda insisted. "Sometimes, people want their loved ones to know when something big's happened without having to say it themselves."

Linhardt frowned thoughtfully, sitting up despite really not wanting to sit up. "I would expect someone who wanted that would want to come up with their own list of who to tell," he pointed out. "I don't know her well enough to be able to anticipate who needs to know." His conversations with Marianne and Manuela had been difficult, like acting in a play without a script, keeping him on his toes as he worried he was saying the wrong lines. Hilda had mastered the high-class social customs he'd practiced in his endless etiquette lessons, and Linhardt knew how to counter her insistences.

"I think her girlfriend would definitely be at the top of the list," Hilda said with a slight laugh behind her words. Linhardt felt lucky that he'd never been swayed easily by good social skills.

"If that list did exist," Linhardt hypothesized, "I'm not sure I would be the one she would want to inform people, anyway. But, assuming that Lorenz gossipped to you and you know the one singular piece of information I gave him, I think I know a way you could help her and have ample opportunity to pull the story out of her, complete with any of my 'heroics' she chooses to share with you." He stopped there so Hilda would have to pursue his suggestion herself, instead of feeling he was lecturing her.

"Yeah? What do you suggest?" Hilda asked, predictably.

"Manuela has her under observation until late tonight," Linhardt told her, "or tomorrow night if things go badly. If you could sit with her for a few hours, you could talk about whatever you liked and I'm sure Manuela would be grateful." He was planning to go back that evening after an early dinner, to ensure Manuela would have time to eat. More than likely, Manuela would just accompany Marianne to the dining hall and have dinner with her, but if Marianne was still tired, Manuela would need the break.

"That isn't-- you don't-- do you even understand what I'm trying to ask you?" Hilda asked, frustrated.

Linhardt sighed. He wasn't the  _ most _ observant person, but he wasn't completely lacking in social skills, either, the way people often seemed to think. "You want to scope out your girlfriend's mental state before you go to see her," he said. "You think, if you ask me creatively enough, I'll tell you what happened last night. I'm telling you no, Hilda. It's Marianne's story to tell." He put his head back down on his arm, hoping Hilda would take the hint.

"You know I'm not asking so I can gossip about her, right?" Hilda asked. "I just… don't want to bring it up if it would be too much for her." Sounds across the table from him indicated she was sitting down. Joy.

Linhardt rubbed at his eyes, trying to get the crust out since he was clearly going to be awake for too long. "Oh, right," he said. "And I know you have trouble with subtlety, so it would be really hard for you to raise the topic gently. Yeah, that makes sense." Total sense. Absolutely.

"Please just tell me she's sick," Hilda said, which was unexpected. There was real, raw emotion in her tone. Linhardt would have expected her cheerful persona to last longer. "Tell me she-- got lightheaded and passed out in the bath. Tell me she slipped on ice and fell. Just tell me anything that doesn't make me think she-- I don't want to think she would--"

Marianne's face flashed through his mind, lit gently by the moon, in the moment when she'd looked at him. It had been blank, analytical, and then turned away from him as she dove forward into the water.  _ Her garments, mermaid-like _ . He would remember that expression for a long time. It left no doubt about Marianne's intentions.

"Even if it was intentional," Linhardt said, hoping he sounded like he was doing a thought experiment and not like he was covering for his peer, "I think it would only be right for you to hear it from her. And, if it wasn’t, it would just be a normal, embarrassing story."

Hilda's eyes were redder than her hair. She looked down and said, "Could you walk me there? I don't think I'm brave enough to see her alone."

"You barely know me," Linhardt reminded her, but he was definitely Awake now and wouldn't be able to stop thinking about Marianne's cool determination any time soon, so he resolved to go with her if she insisted.

"But you're connect to this, somehow," Hilda pointed out. "And I need someone who's less upset by this than I am."

Linhardt sighed, always one to remind people of the inconvenience they were putting him through, but stood up. "Let's get moving, then," he told her. "The shade under the apple tree in the courtyard is perfect for sleeping, this time of day." And the apples were at their sweetest right now, and he was taller than most people and had his pick of the apples on higher branches.

Hilda thanked him only the minimum polite amount, which wasn't her usual style, and he walked her to the infirmary in uncomfortable silence. He tried to raise conversation topics, but none of them caught on.

Hilda paused outside the infirmary door for a moment, then straightened her shoulders and said, "Well, come on then," and took Linhardt's arm and pulled him inside.

It wasn't his intention. He certainly hadn't meant to be implicated in Hilda sort of knowing what had happened. But he sure was inside the room.

"Mari!" Hilda yelled, running to her girlfriend's side. Marianne was sitting up, propped up by some pillows, chatting with Professor Byleth. She startled when she saw Hilda. "Oh, darling, I came as soon as I heard." She leaned down to kiss Marianne's cheek and hug her for several seconds. Marianne raised her arms to hug Hilda back, but she still looked more surprised than anything. Linhardt slipped out of the room.

It wasn't his conversation to witness. He barely knew them; they were Deer. He didn't know why Hilda seemed to want him there, but she could figure it out without a near-stranger in the room, and Linhardt still hadn't gotten enough naps in to compensate for the two days he'd spent awake. He walked the short distance to the courtyard, snagging an apple for himself and leaning against the tree as he snacked and let his thoughts drift. Finally, of tossing the core aside, he sank down to sit against the trunk, shifted his book belt so the book was at his side, then let himself gently slip away.

.-._.-._.-._

He was woken by Caspar, which was refreshingly normal. Sometimes, when Linhardt was asleep and Caspar came across him, the other boy would just work on combat drills until he woke up. So Linhardt woke to Caspar's soft grunts and the sound of his clothes moving over his disciplined form.

"I'm up," Linhardt murmured quietly. Caspar stopped practicing, rolled his shoulders, and started stretching his arms.

"Hey, Linhardt! You ready for that camping trip later?" Caspar asked in his eternally chirpy voice.

He'd forgotten, somehow. That was slightly unusual; Linhardt forgot plenty of things he wanted to do, but seldom forgot things he was actively avoiding. "I'm not, actually," he said. "Thank you for reminding me." What would be a good hiding place? The infirmary, probably, since he was planning to go later, anyway. But there was a good chance Hilda would be there, and that Marianne would be mad at him, and that he'd have to have even more confusing  _ feelings _ about Manuela somehow still wanting to be his teacher, so there were a lot of reasons to avoid the infirmary. Maybe he could just hole up in his room for a while. "I should go prepare. I'll be in my room." He stood slowly -- napping sitting up wasn't ideal, but he did like trees -- and started toward the student quarters.

"Aw, nice! You're actually coming?" Caspar asked.

"Caspar… think about me. Think about everything you know about me. Now, imagine me willingly pitching a tent."

"...Oh."

"Exactly. And now, imagine me going on a long hike through rugged terrain while Hubert attempts to read a map." He shuddered. "No, I won't be going, but I do wish you good luck. Enjoy the beautiful mountain scenery and the camaraderie of sharing a camp meal, and I'll stay here and help Manuela in the infirmary."

Caspar walked with him to his room, asking about various camping-related activities Linhardt might enjoy. It was a misguided effort, but very sweet, so Linhardt answered each question one by one. He was even smiling by the time they got back to his room, until he saw Edelgard waiting outside.

"Wait, she knows," he whispered, yanking Caspar back around the corner they'd just turned. "You do whatever you like. I'm going to go hide."

Caspar looked like he was trying not to laugh, but he kept his voice down when he said, "You're pretty predictable, Linhardt. And, if I were her, I'd also want to have a healer on the trip. Just in case, y'know? It never hurts to plan."

Guilt boiled in the pit of his stomach. The only reason Marianne was alive was because she hadn't seen him at the lake last night. Sometimes, there was only one medic available, and sometimes there were none.

It was too much for him alone. It was the whole world, the weight of everyone in the monastery, on his shoulders. He didn't think before yelling, "Maybe I want one day when I don't have to be your 'just in case’! Maybe I'm a terrible fallback plan! Did you ever think of that? I've only passed my first-year exams!"

Caspar had flinched back. Of course he did; who would expect yelling from sleepy slacker Linhardt? He said, "Whoa, are you alright?" as sharp footsteps approached from where they'd seen Edelgard.

"Linhardt? Was that you?" Edelgard asked as she rounded the corner. "What are you yelling about? Come get packed; we're going camping tonight, and I doubt you've even started." She put a hand behind his shoulder and pushed him along in front of her.

"I don't know if you heard about the eventful night I had last night," Linhardt babbled. "In fact, I hope you haven't, but it seems to have really gone around the rumor mill." He pulled his room key out of his pocket. "I just don't think I'm in any state to go camping, and especially not to go hiking." They were at his door. He unlocked it, hoping he could lock Edelgard out, but she shoved right through with him. "I got plenty of exercise in -- with mild hypothermia, no less -- in the small hours this morning, and I'm beat."

Edelgard sighed and went to sit on his bed. "Linhardt. Start packing."

"I just don't think--"

"Do I look like I care what you think?" Edelgard snapped. "You always find a reason to skip these things, Lin. I'm not letting you treat Ferdinand and Petra that way after all their planning."

"Yes, but I have a  _ real _ reason this time," he told her, making no move to find his travel bag. "I won't be any use to you; I'll just be a slacker who occasionally complains."

Edelgard apparently decided to take matters into her own hands, because she opened his wardrobe and pulled out his rucksack. "Not sure how to break it to you, Linhardt, but that's actually a step up from your usual MO of being a slacker who constantly complains," she said, going to his bed and starting to fold the blanket on it.

"Heal yourself, then!" Linhardt yelled. "I don't care; I'll just ignore you. All of you. If I'm not enough when I'm actively trying to keep everyone alive, maybe I should just stop, see how you like it." He sat down on the floor.

Edelgard rolled up his blanket, strapped it to his rucksack, then went to sit facing him. She looked him in the eyes and said, "I don't believe you."

"I'm done," Linhardt told her, not looking away. "I can't handle it anymore. I can't have everyone's lives on my shoulders."

Edelgard reached down to her hip and unsheathed her belt knife. She considered her hand for a moment, then grimaced and cut a slit down the length of her left ring finger. Linhardt felt his face go pale.

"Well?" Edelgard asked, pushing her hand toward him palm-up as blood oozed out and pooled and dripped around her knuckles. "Are you gonna do something? Or should I go talk to Manuela?"

Linhardt pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket. He turned Edelgard's hand palm-down so he wouldn't have to look at the cut, and did a healing.

"Like I thought," Edelgard told him. She was using his handkerchief to wipe the blood from her hand, and flexing her fingers. "Same old Linhardt. Come pack your things for tonight."

"I'm not going to," he told her. He could feel his hands shaking, so he held them up and tried to bluff his way out. "And, even if I wanted to, I shouldn't. I'm still shaking off the last of the hypothermia. See?" He pictured Edelgard's most recent injury and tried not to shudder so hard it stopped looking like shivering.

Edelgard frowned at him like a puzzle she couldn't solve. That was excellent; she had no idea that hypothermia didn't work that way. She'd have to consult an authority if she wanted to know more, and the most available authority would be Manuela. Manuela was good for helping back up students' excuses.

"You'll want to get some help, then," Edelgard told him, which was perfect. "I'll walk you down to the infirmary if you give me your key. Just in case you need anything, you know?"

Linhardt nodded and handed over his room key. Maybe he could get her to ferry him multiple single items in a row. It would serve her right for frightening him so badly by cutting into her own hand.

"I want to be very clear that I don't believe you," Edelgard told him when they were about halfway there. "And I kind of hate that I don't believe you. I want you to feel like you can tell the truth to me, every time. But, Goddess, Linhardt, you make it so hard to tell when you're lying and when you have an actual problem."

"I'll have to learn to cover up the lying better, then," Linhardt mused.

Edelgard shoved him a little with her shoulder. Linhardt smiled.

Hilda was leaving the infirmary loudly and with just an astonishing number of kisses blown to Marianne from the doorway, along with insistences that she'd be back soon, when Linhardt and Edelgard arrived. They waited patiently by silent agreement, a couple yards away, and the thing that finally got Hilda out the door for good was when she looked outside and saw them. Then it was only a few moments as Hilda said, "Oh, look, Linhardt's here. He took good care of you before, sweetie; I'm sure he'll do a great job of looking after you again." She blew another kiss, professed her love, then, with one last glance at her girlfriend, left the room and shut the door. She looked up at Linhardt and said, "She's all yours. I'll be back in a bit; I'm supposed to be leading a study session in a couple minutes."

"Oh, we're not here for--" Edelgard started.

Linhardt cut her off with an, "If we can yell for help, we can count as observers." He nodded at the Deer in front of them. "Have a productive study session, Hilda."

"Thanks. I don't know if I'll ever be able to focus again," Hilda confessed. "You really pulled her out of the lake?"

Linhardt showed her the quilted fabric on the arm of his coat and said, "I had to change to my winter uniform early until my normal one gets all the mud and algae washed out." He shuddered at the memory. "I guess I know what 'burning cold' means now…" Why was answering Hilda's question so easy when answering Edelgard's questions was so hard?

"You really have a hero on your team," Hilda told Edelgard, touching her briefly on the arm. "Marianne's the best, obviously, but it looks like you guys have a close second in Linhardt."

Edelgard folded her arms and said, "Well, I don't like to brag. Since you brought it up, though, he's definitely the best healer in any house. Come on, Linhardt."

Linhardt waved at Hilda as Edelgard pulled him into the infirmary. "You think I'm the best healer in the Academy?" he asked, smirking.

"Why? Do you think I should have bragged about Dorothea instead?" Edelgard asked. "There's nothing to fear about a Deer, Lin." She glanced over at Marianne, who was sitting up and watching them. "No offense meant."

"None taken," Marianne told her. "Linhardt said you're going on a camping trip tonight? That sounds fun."

"Yeah… Do you know if Manuela's available? I wanted to ask her something." She was holding Linhardt's arm almost uncomfortably tight, so there was no chance of escape.

Manuela swept into the room, then, not sparing a glance for Edelgard and Linhardt as she said, "Well. Always nice to see a loved one, isn't it? And keep doing this well and you can sleep in your own bed tonight, and I can finally have a drink."

"Professor Manuela," Edelgard said. Moment of truth. "I have some questions for you about hypothermia."

Manuela turned around and looked the pair of them up and down. "You haven't had any heart trouble, have you?" she asked Linhardt. "Breathing problems? Exhaustion that doesn't go away with sleep? I didn't think yours was severe enough for that, but I can be wrong."

"I'm definitely still exhausted, and I  _ have _ been sleeping all day," Linhardt told her. "I… think it's emotional, though?"

"Okay, would anyone care to tell me what happened last night?" Edelgard asked loudly, as if the weren't only three people in the room. "Anyone at all?"

"Linhardt and Marianne both had a dip in the lake past midnight," Manuela said. "But, if you want my seasoned medical opinion: not your question to ask." She turned back to Linhardt and said, "Is all this emotional stress related to your shock episode this morning? Because, if it's just a general feeling of dread, that could still be a heart problem."

Edelgard shifted into a stronger stance and said, "So, getting cold after the hypothermia's over isn't a real thing?"

"Oh. No, I was lying about that," Linhardt told her. "Just like you thought. I usually don't have medically relevant amounts of fear, but you weren't listening about that, so I made something up. It's adrenaline that comes back sometimes."

"What on the Goddess' green Earth does 'a medically relevant amount of fear' mean?" Manuela asked, her eyes closed like she was in pain.

"Well, I was shaking for no reason," Linhardt said. He held out his hands and said, "Still am, actually. And… I don't feel like I can be a healer, even though that's the way I can do the most good? And it didn't go away with a good nap--"

"Linhardt." Manuela clapped one hand onto each of his arms and leaned up, looking into his eyes. "This is literally what I was saying I'd help you with this morning. Remember when you tried to run away, so I yelled at you about what a good student you are?"

"You didn't mean it," Linhardt pointed out. No one ever really meant something like that.

Manuela groaned and let go of him. "Goddess' sake… Don't make me say it twice, kid; you'll embarrass both of us."

"I'm sorry, you're sure this is Linhardt you're talking about?" Edelgard asked. "Did you just describe him as a 'good student'? Is this what a stroke feels like?"

They both stared at her. Manuela laughed first, loud and openly mocking. Linhardt just hid his smile behind his hand.

"You missed a lot, Princess," Manuela told Edelgard. "Anyway, none of your lot are dead yet, so I'd say he's doing just fine. And advancing through the ranks at… Oh, that's right, exactly the same rate as everyone else. Or did you think that was by chance?"

Edelgard shifted just slightly into an immovable-looking stance. "Look, all I want to know is if there's any medical reason he shouldn't come survival-camping with the Black Eagles. That is the only question I'm here to answer."

Manuela shrugged. "Kid says he's shaking for no reason," she pointed out. "Hey, Linhardt. You think some exercise and fresh air would help with your adrenaline rush?"

"I think Ferdinand acting like a caricature of a noble knight would make it worse," Linhardt admitted.

Manuela shrugged at Edelgard. "Guess I'm keeping him here," she said. "Have fun on your trip."

"You have to train with us  _ sometime _ , Linhardt!" Edelgard yelled. "This is bullshit, and you know it!"

"Too bad," Manuela said, stepping in front of Linhardt. "My patient now. He gets to sit here for a couple hours, getting bored out of his skull. Enjoy. Your. Trip."

Edelgard heaved a frustrated sigh, turned on her heel, and left. Manuela called behind her, "Hey, does that von Vestra kid read maps as well as he takes directions?" and Edelgard flipped her off before shutting the door on her way out.

Linhardt smiled and tried to step around Manuela. "Well, Professor, thank you so much for your help--"

Manuela put a hand right in the middle of his chest and started pushing him backwards. "You're damn right I helped you," she said. "And now  _ you're _ gonna help  _ me _ by getting better. You eaten?"

The question took him by surprise. "Uh… No, just the toast this morning and an apple earlier," Linhardt told her as he was finally forced to sit on one of the beds. "I can go for some lunch--"

"You come in here on a medical emergency, you stay here on a medical emergency," Manuela told him. "I'm not your get-out-of-team-building-exercises-free card, Linhardt. Hey, Marianne, do you think you could look after this idiot for me, and yell if he tries to leave again?"

Marianne nodded, clearly trying and failing not to smile.

"Good. I'm gonna go take a nap. Marianne, yell if he leaves; Linhardt, yell if she can't breathe. Lunch will be here in a few minutes; tell them to send a third portion. Night, kiddos!"

Manuela swept out of the room as gracelessly as she'd entered it. Linhardt looked nervously at Marianne, who smiled at him with her eyebrows raised.

"Well, I was going to offer to be your observer a little later," he told her, "But I suppose now's as good a time as any." He would have appreciated a nap, though. He pulled his book to the front of his torso, instead, and unstrapped it.

"What did you tell Princess Edelgard?" Marianne asked, nearly grinning at him now.

Linhardt looked down at his book, trying to find his place in it. "I told her that-- that I was in no condition to go camping after all the exertion I went through last night, and then I told her I couldn't stop shaking, which was true." He hadn't meant to speak quickly, but he wanted to be done with this topic as quickly as possible.

Marianne gave him the courtesy of sounding genuinely surprised when she asked, "Are you alright?" She'd been awake when he came in, and when Manuela declared him her patient, but she still asked.

"I'm fine," Linhardt said. "Just shaking." His fingertips ghosted unsteadily over the text in his book as he looked for a piece of text he recognized.

"But why are you shaking?" Marianne asked. Like it wasn't obvious, like she hadn't been the one to pay the price for his mistakes.

"Look, I'm sorry I wasn't able to do better by you," Linhardt told her. He succeeded in looking in her direction, but not in looking at her. "I'm sorry I'm-- not good enough, yet, for what you needed.". His eyes finally focused on one of her hands, looking pale and slender over the madder-red blanket covering her. "You deserve better, and I'm sorry I was the only one available." Manuela would probably yell at him again if she overheard, but Manuela was napping in the next room.

"I'm very confused," Marianne told him. "You saved my life twice, and now you're apologizing for it?"

"Not when I brought you back here from the lake," Linhardt clarified. At some point, his eyes had drifted back to the illuminated border of the chapter page he'd turned to. "This morning. When Manuela went for breakfast. I shouldn't have let her leave me here alone; I can do a lot of healings that work for wounds and sprains, but I just don't know enough about drowning. And I know she said it was okay, but I still want to apologize to you. If I'd been more prepared, or if-- if I was better with people, and didn't take so long convincing Lorenz to get Manuela, then you wouldn't have spent so long unable to breathe. I know even a second or two matters a lot with something so painful." He was shaking harder, but if he didn't tell Marianne how sorry he was right now, he wasn't sure he'd be able to face his housemates again. He could avoid a lot of unpleasant things, but he couldn't avoid healing, not while it was his only useful skill.

"We remember this morning very differently," Marianne told him, which was unexpected. "I think you're underestimating the impact your actions had."

"I'm aware that you survived dry-drowning, if that's what you're hinting at," Linhardt told her. He was talking to her, after all.

"I did," Marianne agreed. "But also, I think I would have survived even if you hadn't gotten Manuela. By the time she got back, I could almost breathe again. It was only a matter of time before I felt well."

She looked pale, still, but maybe that was just her complexion. Someone, probably Hilda, had braided her hair and taped it tightly with blue ribbon. "You look tired, even with Manuela's healing," Linhardt told her. She would only be more exhausted if she hadn't been healed as thoroughly.

"I was tired at this time yesterday," Marianne admitted. "I still think that only having introductory-level healing doesn't disqualify you from doing any at all." She lowered her voice until it was barely audible and added, "And it made a difference to me."

There was nothing to say to that. Or, there was probably a lot to say, but Linhardt didn't know what it was. He flipped forward in his book.

He tried to read about the impact of crests on people's childhoods, but he kept hearing Marianne's voice in his head:  _ it made a difference to me _ . Wasn't that the whole point of healing? Maybe he couldn't burn or freeze a whole squadron (though, to be fair, he was working on that), but he could help people. Not people in their capacities as soldiers, just people. Help them at their most vulnerable, when they were scared or in pain, and make it better.

Lunch came before he could say or do anything about his reflections.

"Alright, I have lunches, ready to go," a servant from the kitchen said, entering the room without knocking. They pulled a cart behind them, with two large pots and some smaller bowls on top and stacks of empty bowls below. "Does fish stew over rice sound good?"

"Lovely," Linhardt replied. "Could you leave an extra bowl on Manuela's desk, as well?"

"Sure thing," the servant replied. "Scallions for you? Sesame seeds?"

"I'll take all the garnishes," Linhardt said. He was impatient for this  _ intruder _ to leave so he could get back to his thoughts without the clanking of dishware, but he smiled politely as he was handed a bowl of stew and as Marianne received her lunch and as a third bowl was prepared for Manuela.

He was shaking worse than the ceramics on the cart when the lunch server left, and he couldn't say why. He'd set his bowl on the bedside table and now tried to return to his book, but Marianne said, "Aren't you going to eat?"

"I'll eat in a minute," he promised, which was a lie. He felt slightly nauseous, even with the enticing smell of fish stew and fragrant rice. He just wanted to get back to figuring out why Marianne's words earlier had had such a profound effect on him.

"It helped you earlier," Marianne said. "You had tea and toast, and you certainly  _ looked _ better."

"I need to-- think for a minute," Linhardt said. What had he even meant to think about? What was it that Marianne had said?

It was mostly quiet as Marianne started eating.  _ It made a difference to me _ , that was what she'd said. And those words hit him like a punch to the chest. He thought them over and over, just to get some of the intensity out of them so he could think more clearly.

"You've been thinking for a while now," Marianne said. "At least three minutes, probably more like five. Are you planning to eat?"

Linhardt turned his head to look at her. He felt almost creaky. How long had he been shaking? That had to have expended a lot of energy. He said, "Sorry. You… really think my healings were that powerful?"

Marianne looked confused. "What, the ones when you were the only one here? I do, but couldn't you tell from the way I was able to breathe again after you healed me?"

He was looking at the table between them. Why was he looking at the table? He'd meant to be looking at her. He forced his eyes up to her face. "Yeah, but… Not well. You were gasping."

Marianne turned her eyes away from him and said, "Yes, well. I certainly preferred it to the alternative." She had a bite of lunch.

Linhardt felt like there was pressure building inside his head, or maybe inside his chest. Emotional pressure was difficult to locate. His attention was pulled in too many different directions: he should eat, and he shouldn't eat, and he should go camping, and he should watch Marianne, and he should read his book and calm down. He was considering all of these simultaneously: if he didn't go camping because he was afraid to be responsible, was he a coward? Did he  _ care _ if he was a coward? If he ate and felt sick, wouldn't that just make trouble for Manuela? But then, what if he  _ didn't _ go camping and someone got hurt? What could he even do before another observer showed up to help Marianne? And what if Crests were actually from some third-party source, and not just between humans and the Goddess? Did his ability to heal mean he was responsible for situations where he could have been present, but chose not to be, and someone got hurt?

"Why do you go out with your house every time they need you?" he asked. "What… drives you? What keeps you from ducking out?" Hilda had called her the best healer in the Academy, and even if that was primarily about house loyalty, it still meant she was the Golden Deer's healer. And Linhardt had been to class with her, and drilled anatomy lessons and minor healings with her.

"Well, they need me, don't they?" Marianne asked. "You said it yourself: I go when I'm needed. I don't put very much thought into it."

"Are you ever afraid that… you won't do well enough?" Linhardt asked. "The scare I had this morning… I realized I might not be enough. If one of my teammates gets really hurt, I might not be able to save them. It could be beyond my abilities. I have no idea what to do about that."

It was a long moment before Marianne said, "I know someone who struggles with that." She hesitated, then continued: "She worries that people will build expectations of her that she won't be able to fulfill, and that someone else will get hurt because of it. So she presents herself as timid and weak, but I've seen her on the battlefield and she's neither of those things. She throws herself wholeheartedly into each battle, and at the end, she's still afraid she hasn't done enough. It sounds like that's how your feelings are working, Linhardt. I've been healed by you, and it was very powerful. I don't want you to think that the fears you have represent your actual abilities when Manuela and I have both seen how skilled and determined you are."

Linhardt considered that. Was he too hard on himself? He was told, constantly, that he was too easygoing.

He breathed deeply in and out and asked, "I should have gone on the Black Eagles trip tonight, shouldn't I?" He already knew the answer. "Does it make me a coward if I'm still glad I'm not going?"

Marianne smiled at him, just slightly, and said, "A friend told me recently that being overwhelmed by your feelings sometimes isn't a personal fault. But, if you're still afraid, I would recommend thinking about the Manuela Distress Checklist we've gone through every time we've met for class."

Linhardt smiled. The name of the checklist would never stop being funny. They'd learned it for analyzing why someone was upset if they couldn't think of a reason, and it had four points: hunger, thirst, pain, and tiredness. "You're telling me to eat lunch," he accused.

"And maybe drink some water," Marianne agreed. "You're in a bed in the infirmary, so I doubt you're uncomfortable. Are you tired?"

Linhardt yawned. "Exhausted. But I can do something about being hungry, and I can't do anything about being sleepy until someone else gets here, so I guess I should follow the advice of a much more experienced medical professional and have some lunch." He was smiling at the inherent ridiculousness of 'eat some food' as standard medical advice, but when he picked up the bowl he'd left on the end table, he noticed he was shaking a little less. He and Marianne didn't talk while he ate, but he wasn't shaking at all when he finished his food.

"The Manuela Distress Checklist worked," he told Marianne as he put his empty bowl down. "I stopped shaking."

"The Manuela Distress Checklist always works," Marianne said. "You don't use it on your housemates?"

"I'm not their mother," Linhardt pointed out. Though, come to think of it, he did keep tabs on those things. He knew which point of the Checklist each of his friends tended to forget, even though he didn't think of it in those terms, and he packed pain killers for Ferdinand's bad leg, let Hubert sleep in his tent without mentioning the nightmares that made him a restless sleeper, brought an extra meal from the dining hall when Edelgard kept nearly the same hours as him… "Oh, Goddess, I've been using the Manuela Distress Checklist on my teammates. I  _ am _ their mother." He groaned inarticulately and leaned forward so his head nearly touched his knees. Marianne laughed.

Linhardt turned his head toward her and couldn't stop himself from smiling as he accused, "You mock my pain."

"Oh, you're in pain? Do you need a healing to finish up the Manuela Distress Checklist?" Marianne asked, and then they were both giggling.

They were still laughing and making fun of their teacher when there was a quick knock on the door and the green-haired Deer kid came in. Linhardt could barely remember his name. Victor? He was pretty sure that was right.

"Ignatz, how nice to see you," Marianne said. "Does this mean the study group's over?"

The green boy, Ignatz, nodded. "Hilda said she'll be back in a couple hours. She has some classes this afternoon, and she said you were doing well when she left. We made you a card, though." He crossed the room and handed a folded piece of paper to Marianne. It had flowers and a rainbow on the front.

"Oh, that was so sweet of you," Marianne said. "Did you paint it yourself?"

Ignatz nodded as Marianne unfolded the card to look inside. "Everyone signed, though. Even a couple Lions and Eagles overheard, and crashed the study session to add their signatures." Ignatz' bright, genuine smile told Linhardt he either didn't know what Marianne had done, or knowing hadn't changed his opinion of her whatsoever.

Marianne reached up for a hug, and Ignatz leaned over and hugged her back. "I'll have to make sure I take good care of myself, then," she said, and she sounded like she was crying. "If everyone's so concerned, I mean."

"Yes, of course," Ignatz said, and stood upright again, smiling. "That's why you're still in here, right?"

So he didn't know. Marianne nodded and said, "Yes, to ensure I'm completely well and there are no complications." Her eyes were bright.

"Ignatz, do you have some spare time this afternoon?" Linhardt asked. "I've been here as Marianne's observer after I came in with a small problem earlier, but if I delay too long, I'll miss a trip my housemates planned for tonight." He had to go. Maybe he couldn't go without worrying about worst-case scenarios, but he might be able to work on his confidence, on not letting his feelings overtake him in a more insidious way than the shock he frequently succumbed to.

"Oh, um… I don't see why not," Ignatz said. "Let me grab some things from my room, okay? I can get a head start on my reading for this weekend." He smiled at Marianne and then, seconds later, he was gone and Marianne was standing her card up on the bedside table.

"You do plan to go on the trip, right?" Marianne asked idly as she smiled at the card her friends had made her.

"Oh, believe me, I'm more than slippery enough to leave without any pretense I'm doing something else," Linhardt told her. "If I just wanted to nap in peace without going, I would enlist Ignatz to watch you while I slept here. They really made you a card for a one-day observation hold?"

"They did," Marianne confirmed, smiling. "I'll… have something to look at, now, if I start to feel overwhelmed again."

Linhardt picked his book up. He checked for his other belongings, but he hadn’t brought any. It was strange to be in the infirmary without even his notebook. Packing his things should have taken more time. He blurted out, “You really helped me,” which was embarrassingly honest, and then tried to lessen the impact by rambling: “With the things you said, I mean. I don’t think I’ve ever helped someone by talking to them, but you did it effortlessly.”

“You helped me, too,” Marianne told him, gracefully choosing one direction to pull the conversation in. “I feel less guilty about what I did since talking to you. I think a little guilt is healthy, considering what I did and all the trouble I caused for everyone, but it doesn’t feel overwhelming anymore, so thank you.”

Linhardt’s face felt hot. That made one (1) person he’d actually helped by talking to them. Possibly two, if accidentally teaching Caspar about height advantage counted. He was pretty sure it didn’t.

“I can’t… actually leave until Ignatz gets back,” he said, gesturing toward the door.

“I know,” Marianne told him. “I appreciate it. Don’t worry; I can tell Manuela you slipped out while I was asleep.” She winked at him, actually  _ winked, _ like they were in cahoots or something.

Linhardt smiled a little nervously. “Well. I wouldn’t want to give up my subpar reputation,” he joked. “I… would thank you to say that. I think, in practice, it will take some time to get used to allowing people to raise their expectations of me. I don’t actually want to do any work; I just… don’t want to let my house down, either.”

Marianne smiled smugly and said, “Well, if you aren’t going to work hard and get a leg up on me, I think I’m supposed to tell you to ‘fear the Deer.’”

“I think you’re meant to say that even if I do put in some effort,” Linhardt pointed out.

Marianne shrugged. “House rivalries aren’t exactly my greatest interest,” she told him.

“Mine, either,” he admitted. “They’re a lot of bother over nothing practical.” The door opened and Ignatz came back. Linhardt stood up. “Well, I’ll see you in class on Monday if I manage to show up,” he said with a nod to Marianne. “If you aren’t released tonight, I’ll be very disappointed to come back to the monastery and find I’m still needed.”

“Get out of here,” Marianne encouraged, grinning. “You need to pack for your trip.”

“Oh, Edelgard packed half my things for me,” Linhardt told her, and yawned. “She gets so impatient. I guess someone needs to know I’m coming along, though.” He yawned again, and waved as he left the infirmary.

He was halfway back to his room before he remembered he didn’t even have his key. He was headed to Edelgard’s, then. That thought, alone, was exhausting; she would expect his epiphany to have a huge, emotional revelation, possibly with a musical number. He resolved to tell her that he’d changed his mind, and that Marianne felt better, and nothing else; he could tell the story to Caspar to take his mind off hiking later, and Edelgard would be supremely jealous that she hadn’t received the deluxe telling of the story.


End file.
